When Sir Peter Viggers next encounters the citizens of Gosport, there are bound to be a few colourful suggestions made about what precisely he can do with the 28 tons of manure included in his expense claims. But even if he tries to argue that the purchase of the fertiliser – or, indeed, of a £1,600 floating habitat for his ducks – was “wholly, exclusively and necessarily incurred” in the performance of his Parliamentary duties, the electors will almost certainly be in no mood to listen.
Across the country, the public is out for blood. The opinion polls, the thousands of letters sent to this newspaper, the savaging of politicians on Question Time, a simple sampling of saloon-bar conversation: all reveal the strength of feeling. Macaulay might have claimed that there is “no spectacle so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodical fits of morality” – but that was before the politicians’ fit of venality, before the reputation of Parliament collapsed under the weight of duck islands, patio heaters and tins of dog food.
Yet, outraged as the public are, it is still possible – if not, as MPs must be hoping, probable – that this passion will subside. Yes, there will be a “kick the bums out” movement at the next election, with a few bad apples forced out by their parties or constituency associations, and a few independent anti-sleaze campaigners entering the House of Commons.
There will be new rules for MPs’ behaviour, perhaps even those proposed this week by Gordon Brown; there will be an election for Speaker, in which the candidates compete to sell themselves as the toughest of the tough and cleanest of the clean. But in a few years’ time things will be back to normal: the public will lose interest in politicians’ behaviour, and it will be noses back into a (markedly smaller) trough.
There is, however, an alternative argument – that the disgust over MPs’ behaviour is part of a wider refusal to be taken for a ride any longer. What enrages us about this scandal is not so much that Douglas Hogg had his moat cleaned, as that he used our money – that the MPs’ ginger biscuits and packets of Maltesers and mock-Tudor beams were bought at the taxpayer’s expense. Especially galling is that although the claims were mostly made in the boom years, they have been revealed in a recession, just as we are all being urged to tighten our own belts and prepare for higher taxes and lower public spending.
It is not just politicians, either. There have recently been a spate of peasants’ revolts – or rather, of revolts of those who have been treated like peasants by a self-satisfied elite. Think of the British and Dutch shareholders of Shell, who on Tuesday voted against their board’s decision to pay executive bonuses for targets that had been missed; or the thousands of people who complained that Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand were being paid millions to leave crude messages on a pensioner’s answerphone.
Think, too, of Gordon Brown’s high-handed claim yesterday morning that a general election now would “cause chaos”, or the spluttering response from BBC grandees to the suggestion that the state broadcaster should trim its sails in tough times, perhaps by cutting the £24.5 million spent on hotels and conferences, the £15 million on air travel, or the £92,000 paid to a hitherto obscure newsreader.
It is not, therefore, the expenses scandal that has stirred up public anger. It is a general feeling that there are people who are using our money to fund lifestyles far beyond the average voter’s – and using their position to exempt themselves from the rules. Ordinary citizens are fined for sorting their rubbish incorrectly, or making an error on their tax return; MPs reconfigure the tax system to their own advantage, or even (in Lembit Opik’s case) claim £40 for a summons for non-payment of council tax. We pay more in fuel duty; they claim for their weekly shop. We are hemmed in by laws and regulations they are free to ignore.
This phenomenon is not restricted to Westminster: consider the inflated titles and salaries that have sprouted up across local government. And even when the members of this privileged class come a cropper, they are cushioned by rewards for failure that are unimaginable in the normal run of things. The pension Michael Martin is set to receive might not match Sir Fred Goodwin’s, but it is more than three times the average wage.These complaints, of course, have been made before. Stories of public sector waste, or fat-cat bosses, have been around for decades (remember Cedric Brown at British Gas?). Nor is it a new idea that in tough times, people are less tolerant of excess among the elite.
But two things have definitely changed. The first is the scale of the public’s anger. The second, crucially, is our ability to do something about it. The introduction of the Freedom of Information Act, the growth of the internet, the rise of the citizen as consumer – all ensure that we can track, and complain about, the performance of public and private figures and organisations far more easily and effectively than ever before. The Conservatives, and in particular George Osborne, are already thinking along those lines, proposing, for example, that all government spending of more than £25,000 should be available for inspection online.
What we are witnessing in politics is certainly a revolt, but whether this revolution has truly lasting consequences depends on the extent to which the system changes: not just whether Westminster is scoured of grime, but whether public supervision of elected officials is entrenched in the system.
Even Gordon Brown now acknowledges that MPs cannot be left to police their own affairs. But his solution, of handing control to yet another “independent body”, is a half measure. Instead, when attempting to strengthen the accountability and legitimacy of Parliament, he and the other party leaders could look around the world, or at the constitutional proposals made by reformers who were, until this week, dismissed as hopeless eccentrics.
In terms of the selection of MPs, there could be a move, already made by some Tory constituencies, to selection via open primaries. These meetings would offer the whole community, not just party activists, the chance to pick a candidate. In the process, they would show whether constituency associations which are reportedly refusing to ditch tainted MPs are truly representative of local feeling.
Members of Parliament could be forced to face such reselection at every election, as a way of policing those ensconced in safe seats, or be the subject of a by-election if a sufficient proportion of constituents petitioned for their departure.
And, while there are many proposals to be made about the conduct of Parliament – such as removing the whips’ influence over select committees by having their chairmen chosen by secret ballot – there are also ways in which Parliament could be policed by the public.
Aside from those “recall” by-elections, we could borrow from the Swiss system of direct democracy: referenda on important treaties or legislation that changes the constitution; Parliament to be forced to consider measures petitioned for by a certain proportion of the population; even an ability to call retroactive referenda over pieces of legislation that prove onerous and ill-advised.
These, and other proposals – for example, the idea, long championed by this newspaper, that civil servants and politicians have been such inadequate custodians of our finances and trust that power should be restored to individuals and communities – have long been dismissed as arcane or irrelevant. Some might turn out to be unworkable or undesirable. They would certainly turn on its head the convention of Parliamentary, as opposed to popular, sovereignty.
But I list them to show that this crisis does not have to end with a return to business as usual: there are proposals that could genuinely re-engage the public with politics.
There has been much citation of Macaulay recently, but perhaps a more reliable guide to popular sentiment is G K Chesterton. When he wrote of “the people of England, that never have spoken yet”, he complained that of our rulers, “some were pure and some were vile; but none took heed of us”.
If the debate about how to reform Parliament does not give the public a voice, then Chesterton’s complaint will feel particularly apt: “We hear men speaking for us of new laws strong and sweet /Yet is there no man speaketh as we speak in the street.”
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